The project of songwriter/guitarist Cara Beth Satalino, Outer Spaces debuted its angsty, ambling indie rock on a couple of EPs before making their full-length debut with the well-crafted A Shedding Snake (2016). Satalino wrote the follow-up in a period of limbo while on a break from her partner and main Outer Spaces collaborator, Chester Gwazda. He ultimately rejoined the lineup, playing bass and keys, recording, and co-producing the resulting Gazing Globe, an album that remains loyal to the debut's midtempo, early-R.E.M.-influenced sound. Without diverging from that point of reference, they channel dreamy Fleetwood Mac on the opening track "I See Her Face." The song's spacious arrangement is populated by delay on chord-establishing keys and a guitar part that functions as rhythm guitar, elegant lead, and duet partner. Satalino's impressionistic lyrics stare into the sun as "Days go by and now we're on another jug of wine." With more active harmonic progressions, the title track adds strings and literal humming atmosphere. Its "gazing globe" was inspired by the idea of a distorted moonlit reflection ("In the night, when you wake up slow...") Other song titles like "Album for Ghosts," "TV Screen," and "I Slowly Close My Eyes" promote the sleep-wake state alongside rounds of bittersweet, echoey guitar. Among the record's bouncier entries are the hooky, saxophone-injected "YWLGOML" ("you won't let go of my line") and closer "Teapot #2." Still reverberating with gentle jangle, its brighter melody and crisp snare start to ease the storyteller back to reality and hint at an eventual happy ending: "Strumming my guitar/I get the strange and fleeting feeling/I may exist upon this earth, for some reason/I may exist, or I may not/I have not decided."